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Series One Episode Fifty-Seven It was 3:08 PM Neopian Standard Time, which meant the middle of the night for the residents of the Space Station. It was always the middle of the night for the residents of the Space Station. The lack of a daytime for the self-contained community led to very liberal sleep schedules: people could stay up as late as they wanted or sleep for as long as they wanted, as long as they could be awakened when they were summoned. Abira Anion was sleeping. More accurately, she was dreaming – dreaming of conquering the Sailor Neopets, once and for all, and not being sent back home with her bow ribbons between her legs like a cliché of a Melodramatic villan. She was also dreaming that her hair was back to its long, blonde, luxurious self…a very good dream indeed. Sailor Chia was about to resign the Sailor Neopets to a fate of slavery of keeping her abundant wardrobe spotless and smelling meadow-fresh when some…robot…thing came in her room and awoke her, informing her that the Exalted Dr. Sloth would like to speak with her. For a second, Abira thought it was going to be praise for her magnificent achievement, or to praise her fabulous hairdo, but then she realized that she was just a failing henchwoman, with a coiffure fit for one of those smelly “punk” people. It was very hard to get out of bed after such a depressing realization, but she managed. “You - are - a - disgrace! I have given you countless times, countless chances to prove yourself, and each time you disappoint me. You have power, I know it, I’ve seen the Chaos faerie give it to you, but when you go in front of those Sailor Neopets, you become this…weakling! You go through gadgets faster than I can build them. Remember the Megablaster 600? Trashed! The Apocalypse-Bringinator? Gone! The 1337-O-Matic? Wrecked! – Though in all fairness, that last one deserved to be destroyed --With all your power, and all the powers the Chaos Faerie is giving you, and all the perks I make sure you have, you constantly lose - in fact . . . you haven't gotten rid of a single one, have you? You really suck, don't you? I mean, my mother (God rest her soul) was a far more successful tyrant than you'll ever be, and she was a SLUG!! A tiny, insignificant, slug!! About this big!” He put his straightened palms closely together, to emphasize her diminutive size. “Yet she was a waster of cities! Until YOU threw her out a window!” Chia sighed. She’d learned to cope with Sloth’s speeches. “Well, god, it’s not like you people pay me or anything.” “You have a place in the ruling class of the Chaos Faerie’s future empire, and that is a more secure investment than anything you could ever receive. “Anyway, for your incompetence, the Chaos Faerie has sent me another assistant . . . hopefully one who will be able to actually carry out a simple assignment . . . perhaps you can even learn something from her?” At that time, a figure in the shadows chose to step into a shaft of light and swirling lint. Chia had noticed her while she was standing in the darkness, leaning against a wall, but thought her to be a mere technician or other laborer around the space station; someone who did not merit closer inspection. Chia knew that it was a tried-and-true fact that you could judge the caliber of someone’s character by their hair, and so she inspected this facet of the newcomer . . . It seemed to look familiar, but who knew; nowadays, everyone was experimenting with coloring, so the possibility of two similar styles existing was there . . . Either way, it seemed too goth for the person under it to be very friendly. She extended a weak hand. About an hour later, Layla Grandisimo and Tammy Naeco were heading to the Terror Mountain Slushie shop. Upon entering the store, two things happened: one, Kami Neko and Tori Nyugyu, fellow sailors, greeted them. Two, a little dingly bell rang. “Hey guys!” Tammy shouted, before sliding into the now-crammed table-nook. “What are you people doing here today?” “Well, we were just hanging out a little before heading over to Zelda’s . . . she said she was teaching Kaen to Z-target . . . whatever that is,” Kami explained, before taking a sip of her mint slushie. “I hope she's quick; who knows what Kelly will do if I'm late.” “Oh, now it’s you who’s got lawn duty?” said Tammy, “I wasn’t sure how long she’d keep you doing her work for her under that blackmail, but it seems like she’s pretty serious about it!” Tammy, along with most of the sailors, were exempt from this, but she sympathized with the ones who had been caught on film by the blackmailer in question. Kami sighed. “I dunno about her, do you think she’ll actually leak those photos? That would just be plain mean, as well as endangering our lives. If Sloth gets our names, he can get our addresses too, and then send some minions to our homes when we sleep! And once we’re out of the way, who knows how many more lives he’ll claim?” “Hmm, well, there’s always the possibility she never really stopped to think about the repercussions . . . and it is a lot of money that you could get for those pictures. Think about how many copies that paper would sell!” “She doesn’t need the money,” stated Kami. Layla asked what she meant by that, so Kami continued, “Didn’t Kaen tell you guys? Her parents died a while ago, so once she was old enough to get her own account, she inherited everything. I heard it was a lot, too.” “Wait, so then, why is she blackmailing us? If she doesn’t need the money, and she could probably just hire people to do this stuff for her . . .” “She probably just likes the feeling of power over people like us. We all know people like that.” The sailors nodded in agreement, thinking about Abira Anion and her control-freakishness. “Well, anyways,” decided Tori, “We should probably just keep her happy for now, but we’ll figure something out soon. We can’t . . . we won’t be her errand girls forever.” She gave a smile before taking a sip of her…milk. “Why’d you get milk?” asked Layla, “It’s a slushie shop!! Why not get something a little more creative?” “Well, milk is delicious AND nutritious. Can you say that about any slushie?” “I, for one, am glad that we’re almost done. Only five more to go! Geez, it’s been so long.” Kami said, and the other girls nodded solemnly. They noticed she’d been careful not to use the word “sailor” in a public setting. “Well, let’s see,” murmured Layla, lowering her voice, “There’s Skeith, Techo, Tuskanninny, Flotsam,” “Wait a second,” interrupted Kami, “didn’t Flotsam appear or something?” “Wait, did she? How do you know?” asked Tammy. “I hadn’t heard anything about it.” “. . . I dunno . . . I thought I heard Kaen say something, but I could’ve been wrong,” Kami tried to explain. You may be confused, humble reader, about Flotsam’s gender for a second, but since these girls have been uninformed about Kintewah’s actual gender, they have assumed that he is a she, like 98% of the other sailors. Continuing, “Okay, so those guys, and Jetsam, right?” “Yeah, and Jetsam.” “Kyrii Cyclone!” A strong gust of wind blew out of Sailor Kyrii’s hands, but it was not enough to kill one of the eight…creatures. “Hey, JubJub, what are these things?” “I dunno, a new species of Virtupet.” “No duh. But what should we call them?” Sailor JubJub inspected them. They looked like crazed white mice, with iron bowls on their heads. She shrugged. “Ironmice?” It seemed to stick. So, anyway, Kyrii couldn’t kill one of the eight Ironmice. It wasn’t until Sailor JubJub attacked with her fierce JubJub Fuzz did it explode. Kyrii thanked her, but on the inside inside, she was furious for being upstaged. This caused Kyrii to put her all into her attacks, and she easily demolished two more Ironmice in a single gust. However, this was apparently not enough to remedy for her bruised ego, as JubJub had just finished four more in the same time span. The last Ironmouse scuttled away. JubJub sighed. “Aw man, I gotta get back in like, five minutes. Ferboll’s gotta go to the Salon. It’s only one…you can handle it, right?” Kyrii realized the impact her saying nay would have on her image as a Sailor Neopet and silently agreed, proceeding to run after it. Layla, Tammy, Tori, and Kami were just finishing up their slushies when all of their communicators began to whistle pleasantly. Tori opened hers to find Kaen on the screen. The pixie began to speak. “Hey guys, I was watching the news, and they were talking about some more Virtupets terrorizing innocent citizens in Tyrannia. I think there were two groups; you guys were pretty close. Up to it?” “Yeah sure, just let me finish my slushie,” said Layla. Once a loud slurping sound announced she had reached the bottom of the cup, Tammy decided they should split up: her and Layla on one group, Tori and Kami in the other. The others agreed. Layla and Tammy had transformed and had just finished demolishing another group of Ironmice at the Tyrannian concert hall when a group of concertgoers crazed with a flaming fandom for the Sailor Neopets group started chasing them. Knowledgeable and rightly afraid of the terrors of uncontrolled enthusiasts, Sailor Quiggle kept them at bay with some mild Quiggle squirts. Thankfully, it was a hot day, and the group was only thankful for the soaking and did not riot in protest. The two were running away when the sumptuous scents of a Tyrannian food stall beckoned to Elephante. Quiggle knew it was useless to try to pull her away and kept running without her. Kau and Acara, meanwhile, were not yet as successful as their partners in justice. They were chasing yet another group of Ironmice through the dense undergrowth of the jungle when Acara collided with another Sailor: Kyrii! After rubbing their bruised noggins, they established that they were both chasing Ironmice. “How convienient!” they said, after establishing the Ironmice had headed in the same direction. “We shall regroup and chase them together!” Kau was confused about one thing though. “Wait, what are those things? And how come everybody seems to call them Ironmice?” Acara and Kyrii stared at her for a few seconds before realizing that those creatures had never been sighted before. Oh well, if everyone agreed on the name, that made things much simpler. They all got up and proceeded to follow the path left by the few Ironmice remaining. After about ten minutes of pushing a path through tropical shrubbery (though it felt like a lot longer), the three Sailors entered a clearing. Their eyes had to adjust to the scene before them. Sailor Quiggle stood alone, grimacing, at another figure…another girl, another Sailor, with her back towards the new group. The new figure had short, chin length black hair, snaked through with red streaks. Her fuku was basic, except that her sailor collar was much longer in the back, reaching down to her calves: it was less a sailor collar than a sailor cape. She turned around and looked them down and up, as a snobby girl might express disdain, except this was slower and more deliberate. She turned one of her feet outwards, grinding the dirt with her heel, and stretched out her fingers, first extending them with her arms a few inches away from the sides of her hips, and then wiggling them like little worms. With her back now toward Quiggle, the ponytailed Sailor took the opportunity to charge, but the new enemy spun around and caught her arm, held it for a second, and threw her to the ground a few feet away. The other Sailors were quite surprised, and stared for a few seconds in something like awe at this newcomer. “Never seen her before,” “—Must be new,” “Who could she be though?” “Beats me” “She gets a cape! I’m so jealous!!” That was Kau. The other Sailors stared at her for a few seconds too, even the new one, and she laughed nervously in response. “Um…I’ll call for backup!!” she said to shift the attention, and bounded away after pulling out her communicator. Acara sighed. “Strategy! We must use it!” Kyrii agreed. But since neither was the strongest abstract thinker, they decided to fall back on Old Faithful: Attack senselessly and quickly. “Acara Tumble” “Kyrii Cyclone!” The new girl spun her cape in front of her, gripping it, and once the kicked-up dust settled down, they realized she was barely hurt, although rather dirty. She then whispered something, and a rumbling was heard by all. Three sharp waves of air and three shockwaves through the earth flew forward and hit everyone but her, knocking all the Sailors to the ground, several feet from where they were standing. The girl extended her wrist and shook it out. By the time Tori rushed back to help, she had disappeared. Chia’s hand hung suspended in the air for a few seconds before the girl from the shadows grasped it. Sloth smiled. “This is the new member of our staff. Sailor Chia, Jetsam. Sailor Jetsam, Chia.” Jetsam smiled as well. “Pleasure.” |